Why is it so hard to create a villain?

My villian is simply an asshole. He steals, takes advantage of women with low self-esteem, flicks cigarette butts at stray cats, sells dope to kids, cheats on girlfriends, etc. I try not to go overboard as to make him cartoonish.

Amplify something that you think is good. Amplify it until it becomes harmful.

A related idea: Monomania about anything, even about something good, becomes destructive. Amplify someone's desire for something good until it becomes "at all costs."

Dale

K. Taylor said:

Coming up with an original Big Bad is so hard for me. If I manage to come up with anything, it just feels "been there, done that".

What do you do to come up with the Big Evil for your heroes to defeat?

My 2 MCs have been thought up and sketched out, but I can't start writing until I have the reason they meet - coming together against the bad guy......it's hella frustrating, as I love these two in my head and can't wait to see them interact.

Are there any original ideas for villains left in the world?

ETA: It's what the villain's going to do that's so evil that I have a hard time with. Once I know the "evil plot", then I can justify motives. And personality isn't that hard, either. I need the objective.

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To answer your question "Why is it so hard..."

I think becuase in our society, we don't think of evil people or bad people as fully developed. We tend to simplify them, throw them into nice neat little boxes.

In order to have a real villian IMHO, they need to be 3-d, flushed out, have a 'logic' behind their motives that isn't just some flat "I'm evil ,bwahawhawha"

Also,

I would be less worried about having a 'unique' villian and be more worried about have a solid story. Unique doesn't always translate into good.

But if your villian is 'real' and 3-d, he will be unique because we are all unique. We are all special unique snowflakes

Mel...

I've always seen villains as misunderstood heroes. They have had things happen to them; they merely react to what happened as best they can. Sometimes the heroes are the epic jerks - I mean Rand in The Wheel of Time pulls some very anti-hero moves, but he is the hero of the story. Sometimes, he's as bad as the bad guys; but because he is trying to STOP the world as we know it from falling into darkness, he is the hero.

Some people think of Castro as a hero, you know. It's all perspective.

K. Taylor said:

Coming up with an original Big Bad is so hard for me. If I manage to come up with anything, it just feels "been there, done that".

What do you do to come up with the Big Evil for your heroes to defeat?

My 2 MCs have been thought up and sketched out, but I can't start writing until I have the reason they meet - coming together against the bad guy......it's hella frustrating, as I love these two in my head and can't wait to see them interact.

Are there any original ideas for villains left in the world?

ETA: It's what the villain's going to do that's so evil that I have a hard time with. Once I know the "evil plot", then I can justify motives. And personality isn't that hard, either. I need the objective.

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I too had a problem with this, especially because I don't really believe in evil. These books helped:

The Psychology of Military Incompetance - essentially why generals do stupid, selfish, or luddite things that destroy careers and get people killed. You can extend this to non military examples.

Liberal Facism - You can either read this as a scary insight into the right-wing mindset of the person who wrote it, or an scary insight into the way the left tends to want to force people to do things "for their own good". Or both.

Without Conscience - more than you ever wanted to know about Psychopaths.

War of the world - a good readable account of one of the worst centuries in human history.
You might also want to look to historical prototypes of evil in action: crusaders, witchburners, Nazis, and most Byzantine politicians.

K. Taylor said:

Male is a blind vampire that was turned just before he could take vows as a monk, so he tries not to kill people. Female is a mortal paladin working for a secret order for all things good and saving the world.

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That vampire had luck. If the cleric had had a few more levels, he would have destroyed that vampire instead of just turning him.

...Anyway...

So why isn't the male main character the evil? He's a vampire. Everybody wants to kill him. Even the holy sun itself wants to kill him. He has to be afrait of virtually anyone, even the weakest boy can throw a bottle of holy water that creatly damages the vampire. He must defent himself. But given that he can't maneuver overland during the day he is in a serious tactical disadvantage. He has to defent himself preemptively!!
And he has to eat. And there is really no reason to think it's more evil to eat humans then pigs and cows. He is just a natural predator, not evil. Humans are evil, most don't even have the guts to kill their food themselves.


Well, the real evil could be a vampire, too ...



Generally speaking about motivations: There really is only world domination and world destruction. Any villain who thinks otherwise just does not think on a big enough scale.

Oh and a nice link for more information how fun it is to be evil:
http://evil-guide.tripod.com/index.html
That side is about as old as the internet but still funny.

Ruv Draba said:

A few villains aren't created that way. The monsters from Alien, or Freddy Kruger from A Nightmare on Elm St, or Jason from Friday the 13th, are just created from nightmares.

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I'll give you the critters from Alien but I thought Kruger started off as a serial killer who targeted kids, according to the first movie. The neighborhood parents banded together, chased him into an abandoned factory (or was it and old boiler room) and burned him to death. Then he came back as a nightmare figure.

Or do you mean that the standard serial killer bad guy is a creation from nightmare?

AceTachyon said:

do you mean that the standard serial killer bad guy is a creation from nightmare?

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I mean that the specific characters of the alien from Aliens, the shark from Jaws, Freddy and Jason are created from human nightmare -- a pastiche of human fears refined to spook us out. Whereas the character of Lecter say, is a creation of perversifying something familiar and trusted -- which also works.

The motivating question was 'are there any more original villains'? I think that the answer depends on what sort you create: nightmare or perverse hero.

It's hard to come up with original nightmares because human fears are so familiar. There's no great difference between Sauron and Darth Vader. Like Jason and Freddy, they're all the bogieman who lives under the bed.

If you want to go with a bogieman-under-the-bed villain then I feel that you're better off putting the familiar into an original context (e.g. Sauron in his stone wasteland, Darth Vader in his battlestar, Freddy in his basement, or Jason in his abandoned campsite). Then just play with props.

Alternatively, if you want the villain itself to be original (psychologically, socially and not just physically different), don't go for a nightmare. Rather, go for a perverted hero -- there are new kinds of heroes appearing all the time, and many ways to pervert them.

If you want to tell them apart, bogieman villains need a suitable setting; perverse heroes fit in almost any setting. You can't put Darth Vader on a picnic or in a kid's party without humour. Lecter however, fits in both places just fine.

I either think of someone I don't like, or someone who believes something that I think is way, way off base.

It's really, really fun making the people I don't like the villians (insert evil laugh here), especially because if there is no physical similarity, they would never recognize themselves for their awful traits.

Some of the worst evil is small and insidious.

I find the best way to make a villain is take all of the traits of the heroes and flip on of them to its extreme opposite, preferably on that will make an unreconciable problem.

Take the main villain of my WIP for example. I have a breed of demon that when killed has a "Phoenix" effect where they create an exact duplicate of the person that killed them. This "Twin" or "Clone" has an unstoppable driving need to kill the original. My villain fails and fails and it drives him to the point of doing anything to get rid of the drive. he butchers my MC's friends and is always trying to get in his way. But he has the exact same traits in everything else but that drive makes him do somethings that my MC could never do.

Now to your story.

Paladins and monks both fought on the side of god or whatever you have in your world. their traits were;
Devoted: They would do whatever was required of them by their diety
Faithful: Then knew their deity would reword them for their devotion. and knew their deity exists.
Concerned for others: speaks for self.
Worships a good diety: again, speaks for self.

Now a good villain for these guys;
Devoted: He will do whatever his god requires him to do, and isn't going to stop.
Faitful: he knows his god exists, and that he will reward him for his devotion.
Concerned for others: He wants to bring them the word and rule of his diety.
Worships an evil diety: This is your confilct.


He could be doing anything from trying to rid the world of the "Lost" that aren't part of his gods fold, by quite litterally getting rid of them. He could be trying to open a gate to let his god out of the prison the 'evil' gods of your heroes put him in.

Its your world, now make a villain that is as strong and wise as your hero with some small difference. The line between good and evil is soooo small and fragile, that it is easily crossed.

AceTachyon said:

I'll give you the critters from Alien but I thought Kruger started off as a serial killer who targeted kids, according to the first movie. The neighborhood parents banded together, chased him into an abandoned factory (or was it and old boiler room) and burned him to death. Then he came back as a nightmare figure.

Or do you mean that the standard serial killer bad guy is a creation from nightmare?

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they threw torches through the window of his house. The house got restored but his "ghost" decided to hang out for a while.

I don't like that bottom-up construction (first some bits and the characters and then work them together into a story).

The best characters are created by the story. And that includes villains.

You allready have a five word summary: "a fantasy adventure romance story"

And probably have a few bits of the rest of the story, too. But work into a one page summary of the story, too. Let me speculate a bit:






The female paladin is not the hero of songs and tales. She is a cold headhunter for the temple of "God of Protection, Good and War but not necessarily honor."
This job creates enemies naturally, this time in the form of a demon worshipper of sorts. She slays him, but did not realise that he has allready summoned a powerful demon. As she's away, the demon brings his worshipper back from the dead - a procress that has some advantaces and a horrible price (sounds totally evil, don't you think?). Well evil guy later destrory the whole temple but either She-Paladin escapes or he can't yet face her because the memory of his own death is still too shocking.

Anyway, the fight goes on, Paladin tries to get him, fails for some time and finally totally looses his track. Another temple has more jobs for her. One is a vampire, about to create a clan (Male main character's headvampire).

At that time at the vampire clan: The Head has 3 young vampires. He has mental dominance over them and forces them into a bloody evil contest: Find the best food for the master. Measured are pureness of the victim, stealthyness of extraction and overall style. Male Main however does not have the intention of winning. When he visits the temple he realises that the holy place does not hurt him but keeps the masters voice out. An old friend and temple-guard needs to play victim and they both arm themself with holy water and (the temple guard only) a holy symbol.

Back at the vampire den it does not take long before the fight breaks out. The other victims (a whore and a little girl in a white nightdress) are of no help and as the head vampire stops Main, they realise that this might have been a bad plan. In bursts female Paladin - in fact she had been hiding for a few hours now, her originally plan being to wait untill dawn but given the opportunity she changes it. Now the fight looks more even and is decided when another student realises that his master's mind is busy enough with Main Male. Because having someone who can control your every move is bad, he pushs him into the wounded temple guard who can shove his last flasks into the monster's mouth.
But said vampire also has an escape plan. He mentally dominates the girl into furiousely throwing herself into the paladin's sword (to the suprise of the Main Male, who does not (yet?) have such skills - btw another case of totally evil, isn't it?) and runs for it.

Well, the last student vampire is quickly dispatched (only there because I liked 3 more and maybe will have some use in the fine description of the scene later) and the Paladin decides to leave the "good" vampire alive for now.

And that's where the story really starts. The two hunt the escaped vampire, getting to know each other better, getting to hate (She shows him what he lost, a connection to a good deity, she is supposed to hate him by job definition) and desire each other (opposite genders in life and death situations - it often ends sexy).

Then her nemisis reappears and declares that he used the time only to grow more powerful and overcome that stupid post-death-trauma. Now there is a big 3-way fight but the heroes are not into the real problem untill escaped vampire decides that the demonist could totally kill both problems if he was a vampire on top of that, creating the über-villain.


That was only an example, of course, I guess that the probability of you writing something into that direction just dropped, now that someone else came up with it. But that way, I would start getting the idea of the characters. And now I can fine design them.

Grot Fang.
Former Half Ork, now Vampire.
Like most people of orkish heritage, Grot's usual aproach to solving problems is slashing sharp metal into the problem's face (something usual). In contrast to most of his kin, however he is quite methodically and intelligent in working towards this solution (something unusual). He can have some fierce, impulsive tempers but he knows that, considers it a personal flaw and often meditates to get more controlled (transforming hot irascibility into cold thirst for vengeance) (heroic trait with a twist). He likes having become undead because he never liked days anyway and feels the patience, of someone who is not aging, growing fast. He shows a lot of signs of a sociopath, not the cruel sadistic evil laughter kind of guy, he just does not care a bit for other people (his kind of evil).
He does not take it personal, that the heros want him dead, he wants that dead, too, and probably could not understand that the others are so emotional about that kiling each other stuff. He is a pefectionist, he considers himself superior and has high standards (he is quite a badass, so he somewhat has a point). Thus, personal setbacks are a weak point and confronted with his failure, his primitive, angry side will likely shine through the reserved, controlled outer shell (and a weakness. Not neccessarily the weakness that will have him killed at the end).

It's Vampire romance. One of the lovers is a (part-time) monster. This can end in "Evil wins" and "everybody loses". And overall, there does not have to be a big evil. Either character can be evil - or both. The world can be a faceless evil (She has to protect him from the other nameless vampire hunters or something).

You have a very special main character. Blind, vampire, mostly pacifist. I can hardly believe that this works. And then you want to find a way to get him into specific situations - I don't believe that works. You should just let the story evolve - mostly cronologically.

Modern times are especially tough for vampires. At least for the interesting kind of. They are easily identified and then some 3-letter-organisations will take care of them.
You kill someone and a bunch of policemen is chasing you. Once anywhere a vampire is found, weeks later every public camera will have an infrared addon and there will be an automated check for people with no body temperature and thus vampires couldn't even life in big cities anymore. And it's just getting easier in a world where the government employs wizards!

I'd really go back with the story - if only 20 years - or go forwart into a near future, where worldwide economic crisis has brought polices and governments to a state of mostly powerlessness (like 10 years or something? ).


Anyway, that is the kind of speculation you should do. Just write the story (or better: a rough script) and see who happens to naturally become the enemy. A headhunter? Some cooperation? Or will it be personal, like a rejected lover, who begrudges their love? (Or all that mixed together)

The best villains are perverse heroes in their own stories. (I'd also argue tat some characters, like Jason and Jaws, are not villains at all, but metaphors for the dark aspects of nature, but that's a different conversation).

Darth Vader -- possibly the best movie villain ever -- is the tragic guardian of a lost art, a fallen knight who still tries to convince himself that if he just gets a little more power, then finally the galaxy will be at peace. This can be seen from Revenge of the Sith on, but is most present when he tries to corrupt Luke: And there is it in red, the delusion that allows Vader to function, that belief that somehow if he just cracks enough skulls, he can bring peace and order to the galaxy.

Villains who are evil for the sake of being evil only belong in parody and comedy (Lord Dungledore on Krod Mandoon And The Flaming Sword of Fire comes to mind), so the key to creating a memorable villain is to infuse them with a sense of moral purpose. Give them a noble goal, but then allow them to use "by any means necessary" and "ends justifies the means" thinking and set them lose on the world. As long as their moral purpose brings them into conflict with the ideals of the hero, you've got drama to drive your story.

I just hate that villains lose in so much literature. Real life says otherwise, and I think it's more interesting to see the villain win, or at least succeed in most of their goals. That's why I liked the comic "Watchmen" because in the end the villain, succeeded and by doing so, even as horrible as it was, saved the world.

Sometimes it takes a villain to truly do the things that need to be done.

UndeadDM: And what with Professor Moriarty, the original supervillain?
I don't know the books but it looks like he is really only into power and riches.

What about Lex Luther? And what about the Joker?
Or the first vampire villain: Dracula. Do not mistake his bit of Mina for anything romantic, he just wanted to hurt Mr. Harker with that.
Lo Pan (Totally kickas villain) and General Zod (the Dragon meets the Brute) - simple, evil. Simply evil.

Or to take a classic book: Sauron is definitly not trying to enslave Middle Earth "for the greater good". He is simply evil and probably knows it.

Maraxus said:

Sauron is definitly not trying to enslave Middle Earth "for the greater good". He is simply evil and probably knows it.

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Don't make me go all Noam Chomsky on your ass.

I'm trying very hard in my WIP to make an entire organisation the bad guy, but all the people who are part of it are quite sympathetic. Or at least, not villainous. Well, slightly.

Ah, who am I kidding? They're a bunch of power-hungry megalomaniacs. But only because of the institution they are in. None of them, at least, see themselves as bad.

I had a hard time with my antagonist, too. Reworking him into a three-dimensional character became one of my main goals for the second draft. The other one was figuring out exactly what his Evil Plot (TM) was and refining it (especially since plots are my downfall). So I can completely sympathize with your frustrations.

Honestly, I came up with the basics of the evil/plot connection in my story by pure necessity: what needs to be done to serve the MC's plotline? Have the antagonist do it. But - and this is what I'd missed in my first draft - what good reason, to his thinking, does the antagonist have for doing what he did?

For example, my antagonist murders my MC's royal father, frames the MC, and steals the throne. MC spends rest of novel trying to clear her name and regain her claim to the throne. Standard stuff, I know. But in my antagonist's mind, the former king was a horrible ruler who was damaging the city and harming the people. The antagonist honestly believed he was morally and ethically right for the whole murdering and usurping part.

Hope this helps, or at least makes sense. If it doesn't, just re-read what Euan H, FOTSGreg, and Richard B said

I have absolutely no trouble coming up with a villain. I've had plenty of startling examples in my own life and all of them have come with their own little twist.

And that's the entire point really. People are people and we share common characteristics...it's the twists of our personality that make us unique.

Ask yourself, if you were to let go of all your societal rules you've adhered to, what would you do. Get into the mind of someone who sets aside those rules and rationalizes doing it or as a sociopath, has no feeling of what's wrong or right and doesn't care. Apathy is typically one of a really bad guy's attributes. They don't care so they do whatever they want to whomever they want and walk away without remorse or regret.

Dommo said:

I just hate that villains lose in so much literature. Real life says otherwise, and I think it's more interesting to see the villain win, or at least succeed in most of their goals. That's why I liked the comic "Watchmen" because in the end the villain, succeeded and by doing so, even as horrible as it was, saved the world.

Sometimes it takes a villain to truly do the things that need to be done.

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The unwilling hero is rarely a true scenario in my experience. If they do anything to help someone else, it is to save themselves. And I've yet to see a situation outside of fiction where someone was saved by the selfishness of another person. That's just wrapping it up nice, putting a pretty bow on it so it can be dealt with easier.